(X TIIK MAXA'iKMKXT OF MONEY. 89 



forbid you to become surety to Pythias for an obligation which it bel 

 not to Pythias but to Chance to fulfil ? I am the last man to say, " Do 

 not help your friend," if you honourably can. If we have money, we 

 manage it ill when we can not help a friend at a pinch. But the plain 

 fact is this : Pythias wants money. Can you give it, at whatever stint to 

 yourself, injustice to others ? If you can, and you value Pythias more 

 than the money, give the money, and there is an end of it ; but if you 

 can not give the money, don't sign the bill. Do not become what, in rude 

 truth, you do become a knave and a liar if you guarantee to do what 

 you know that you can not do should the guarantee be exacted. Hr N 

 generous who gives ; he who lends may be generous also, but only on one 

 condition, viz., that he can afford to give what he can afford to lend : 

 of the two, therefore, it is safer, friendlier, cheaper in the long-run to give 

 tli an to lend. Give, and you may keep your friend if you lose your 

 money ; lend, and the chances are that you lose your friend if ever you 

 get back your money. 



But if you do lend, let it be with the full conviction that the loan is a 

 irift, and count it among the rarest favours of Providence if you be ever 

 repaid. Lend to Pythias on the understanding, " This is a loan if you 

 ever can repay me. I shall, however, make this provision against the 

 chances of a quarrel between us, that if you can not repay me it stan-i 

 ift." 



And whatever you lend, let it be your money, and not your name. 

 Money you may get again, and, if not, you may contrive to do without it ; 

 name once lost you can not get again, and if you can contrive to do with- 

 out it, you had better never have been born. 



With honour, poverty is :\ Noble; without honour, wealth is a Pauper. 

 f not so ? Every young man not corrupted says ' ^i It is only 



Id cynic, no drop of warm Mood in his veins who says, 

 a boon without honour." 



knock at your <loor and show you a bill with your name 



> to pay, and the bill ! dishonoured, pray what beoomee 



My name I" Caltera hamon. I am 1. ut a surety; goto Tyt 

 Pythias baa bolted !" 



tin- I. ill, Damon, or good-bye to your honour ! 

 hir.l.'ii my proli .-ipt to be garrulous. V 



ed aii<l known litV. And, alas, what care i > I'li^lit in 



ii jail or in azile ; what talrnK profuse in their 

 die off Without coming to fruit; what virtu-'- tin- manlic-t rot into \. 



